There is a long standing belief in the political world that as Ohio votes so does America. Over the last 11 presidential elections, the old cliché has held fast with the eventual president winning Ohio each time. In 2012, the state is once again expected to be at the center of president politics, making the 2010 Ohio gubernatorial election the first skirmish in the Republican attempt to unseat President Obama.

How the election plays out has huge ramifications for who becomes our next president since whoever holds the Ohio governor’s mansion in 2012 will have a distinct advantage in delivering the state to their respective candidate.

Everyone expects a vicious battle between Democratic incumbent Ted Strickland and the Republican challenger John Kasich. Even with a Republican victory in the gubernatorial race, however, the Party won’t be unified going into the 2012 presidential election due to the leadership’s willingness to shun Ohio’s conservative voters.

Longtime Party Chairman Bob Bennett was despised by conservatives in Ohio for running luke-warm Republicans at the expense of more conservative challengers. He was known for championing anti-gun, pro-abortion, big government candidates for flagship seats like Governor and Attorney General.

The same machine also helped put Mike DeWine, an endorsee of the Brady Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, in the United States Senate.

When DeWine lost his reelection bid in 2006, most conservatives thought he would retire from public service. The subsequent retirement of Party Chairman Bennett left many conservatives with optimism over the future of the ORP. Their departure gave Ohio conservative Republicans hope that things would finally change.

Unfortunately, any hope of reform was dashed when ORP leadership paved the way for Mike DeWine to be the nominee for Ohio Attorney General. The move sparked near hysteria among the conservative wing off the Party, and set in motion a series of angry public protests over the backroom deals used to fast track DeWine’s endorsement. To clear the way for DeWine, the ORP forced Dave Yost out of the AG race and forced him run for State Auditor.

Ohio’s pro-life and pro-gun groups fully supported Yost for AG due to his conservative values and strong qualifications based on his background as a no nonsense County Prosecutor.

Adding to conservative angst is that State Rep. Seth Morgan, a well qualified Auditor candidate due to his background as a certified public accountant, was already in the race and is the only other strong conservative on the ORP statewide ticket.
The way conservative Republicans see it, another back room deal by the Ohio Republican leadership forced them into a no win situation. Either they can support leftist candidates like Mike DeWine, or stay home and give control of the state’s most powerful offices back to the Democrats.

The backroom deals led to a revolt from within manifested by a slew of new candidates with ties to Ohio’s Tea Party groups running for central committee seats. It’s clear that this time the Republican leadership in Ohio pushed the wrong buttons.

Oddly enough, Republicans in the Ohio House and Senate are staunchly pro-gun and most have strong conservative credentials. Yet, the ORP continually fails to elevate conservatives to a place of prominence on the statewide ticket.
Any hope the Ohio Republican Party had to capitalize on the growing anger over President Obama’s leftist agenda is being swept away by their willingness to champion candidates like DeWine. They also failed to recognize the anger generated by Obama’s backroom deals while negotiating health care reform and used the same cloak and dagger politics to clear DeWine’s path to the AG nomination.

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Valentino Chronicle was once again published on the national news website World Net Daily (wnd.com). The article discusses the effects of blind loyalty on advocacy groups like the National Rifle Association, National Organization for Women, Civil Rights groups and Labor Unions.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s racially charged comments brought to the forefront how Civil Rights groups have stopped caring about advocating for Civil Rights, and have instead become shills for the Democratic Party. By being in the pocket of the Democrats, any advocacy group gives up their autonomy and a lot of their power.

Same for groups that fall under the thumb of the Republicans.

You can find the full article here:

http://www.wnd.com/?pageId=121713

Over the last few months the anti-gun movement, with help from the establishment media, has started a new attack campaign with their usual flair for the dramatic, and lack of concern about the facts. Every article on gun-control during that time period mentioned that America has loosened regulations on buying, carrying and owning guns over the last three decades.

It is as if media outlets from Foxnews to Politico.com to Philly.com to The Washington Times all got the phrase from the same place.

We’ve seen this play before, from the use of the term “Saturday night special” or “assault weapon,” the anti-gun movement gets the media to define a type of gun or type of law in the most provocative way possible. Usually, the anti-gun talking points are welcomed by the establishment media because anything provocative increases television ratings and circulation rates of newspapers.

You can also bet that by defining our current gun laws as “loose,” the anti-gun leadership is setting up the debate so they can claim to want to “tighten” regulation, not enforce an outright ban on private ownership or repeal concealed carry laws.

Instead, they will be repackaging the old argument for reasonable gun control with a new less threatening catch phrase.

Many Americans will believe that “tightening” gun laws won’t infringe on the right to bear arms but instead will help keep criminals, or the mentally ill from getting their hands on a gun. Pro-gun advocates immediately see through the tired tactics, but the establishment media knows that the gun issue is a ratings bonanza, so they will quietly look the other way when our adversaries repackage old arguments.

After all, in the last few months, the “loose” gun laws in Texas and Florida were supposedly responsible for high profile spree killings. In both cases, the accused shooter allegedly had mental health issues and used the “loose” regulations to bypass the process designed to keep certain demographic groups from buying a gun.

Transferring responsibility to the gun laws instead of keeping it squarely where it belongs – with the shooter – is another long used tactic of the anti-gun movement.

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The terrorist attack committed by Major Nidal Malik Hasan at Fort Hood, Texas brought the lack of security at such a large military base directly into homes across America. Leaders of the pro-gun movement, and many soldiers, weren’t quite as shocked because they knew most military bases are considered “gun-free zones, “due to concealed carry being banned.

Whether Hasan’s attack on American soldiers was sponsored by one of the bigger terrorist organizations is irrelevant since it gave terrorists a road map to complete similar attacks in the future. You can bet our enemies learned valuable lessons from his ability to kill so many of our best and brightest in such a short period of time. In one fell swoop, he taught terrorists where Americans are essentially defenseless.

His lesson included an easy way for our enemies to pick a spot to strike again – simply follow the “no gun” signs.

To think that terrorist organizations won’t learn from Hasan’s success is to live in a dream world. But then the anti-gun community in America has always lived in a dream world. Their adherence to a policy of disarmament for law-abiding citizens is nothing short of crazy, because we know criminals won’t turn in their guns.

The anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall was celebrated throughout the world earlier this year, which brought our victory in the Cold War back to national prominence. Imagine if we decided to win the Cold War by unilaterally dismantling all of our nuclear weapons without any expectation the Soviet Union would do the same and you have a blueprint for how the anti-gun movement wants to win the war on crime.

That’s not a far-fetched analogy since the anti-gun leadership clearly thinks having honest Americans turn in their guns will somehow force common criminals to turn their guns in as well. After all, if you believe the anti-gun movement’s logic, criminals are really honest people who become bewitched by an evil object that uses guile and cunning to overcome their otherwise law-abiding sensibilities. Full Story »

The entire nation is engrossed by the media coverage of the armed thugs that killed a Florida couple known for adopting developmentally challenged children. It seems that the criminals attacked and killed a truly generous and caring couple who had dedicated their life to helping the less fortunate.

What most people missed in the coverage, however, is that the criminals apparently trained for weeks prior to the home invasion, and it took place with near military-like precision.

All of the anti-gun loons out there who claim calling the police is the best option can’t refute that the thugs who committed this horrible crime were in and out before anyone could respond.

From a report at Foxnews.com:
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